


After Midnight

by hosiexa



Category: LOONA (Korea Band)
Genre: F/F, Please someone stop me, Yerim definitely took Hyejoo to church, angst ending, as weird as me, i can't get over hyerim
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-30
Updated: 2020-01-30
Packaged: 2021-02-27 06:02:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,870
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22482244
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hosiexa/pseuds/hosiexa
Summary: When Son Hyejoo, the only daughter of the Chief Executor of the Holy Inquisition and, secretly, a full-time dreamer, sees herself as a traveling companion and a personal headache for the witch Yerim, she commits herself to making the most of heradventure, giving her heart and confidence to the beautiful purple-haired magic usurper.But she definitely didn't expect to end up breathless.
Relationships: Choi Yerim | Choerry/Son Hyejoo | Olivia Hye
Comments: 5
Kudos: 31





	After Midnight

**Author's Note:**

> HELLO BEAUTIFUL PEOPLE DFGHKL HOW YA DOING?? i hope ur all ok!
> 
> ... also, i don't need to explain anymore why i always take so long to post things, right? you all already realized how ramdom i am. or at least i hope so. although it's not rlly my fault bc HEY my head sends me creativity whenever it wants to, so get used to it. 
> 
> and i think we know each other good enough, BUT i'm saying one more time: i'm was not born in a country that has english as the main language, ok? so you already know that you might find some mistakes, right? GOOD!
> 
> i must say: i have no idea of what i just wrote. 
> 
> enjoy!

**Northern Scotland, 1630**

_Cathedral of the Holy Inquisition_

  
  
It is a cold dawn when the young Son Hyejoo, the only daughter of the chief executioner of the Holy Inquisition, wakes up in a cold sweat. She had had a nightmare, one more, just like the others she has been having every night for a good five weeks, since the day of her eighteenth birthday, which, coincidentally, fell on a Blood Moon day, the so-called party of the witches.

She gets up from the mattress and leaves the room, which she shares with the five nuns in the cathedral. She takes a freshly lit candlestick with her in one hand and heads for her recreation room, the only thing her father had let her have, while she wearily puts on a white linen robe over her light pink nightgown.

The small square room is composed of a desk, a chair, both made of white wood, a cupboard with books — all the ones the church allows her to read —, an armchair and, of course, the fragrance of mint and mold. On the wall in front of the door, there is the eccentric rectangular window of the room showing the horizon, and an astronomical telescope that, in Hyejoo's opinion, is the most functional object in the world.

It is a secret of hers to own the object, given as a gift by a great friend of her mother, Galileo Galilei, before the woman's death. The Inquisition would never let her have anything like that, they would call her a witch and tall that, just like they did with the scientist, but Olivia, the Catholic name given to Hyejoo, is passionate about her toy and even more fascinated by the stars and the way they shine in the moon's shadow.

She places the candlestick on the table, next to the scented pens and stationery, and places the white cloth of the armchair in the gap between the door and the floor, so that she will not be discovered by some eavesdropper. Olivia opens the window until she can aim the telescope at the sky, feeling the freezing breeze invade the tower room, adjusting the equipment's lens before peering.

She is a young girl peculiar, that Son Hyejoo. Her father's friends and colleagues says she is strange, weird, and that she should have stayed with her mother's family in the lands of Korea. If it weren't for the difficult temperament of her father figure, she would already be there, for sure. However, she had been forced to remain in that terrible place, where she was forced to watch hangings and women burning at a huge bonfire at all times and, above it all, to pretend to be someone she was not. A worse nightmare than the ones her head created!

She does not agree with the Church, she has no desire to become a nun, she does not want to marry one of the many suitors her father arranged for her; she does not aspire to dinner with royalty and, above all, she is not intended to follow doctrines from someone she doesn't even know if really exists. Therefore, if she does not want to die like the others who let their thoughts be blown away, Hyejoo has to remain quiet, discreet, unnoticeable in the eyes of the others, waiting for the time to escape that hell.

What about returning to the province of her maternal family? Olivia has been communicating with her grandmother and aunt on the subject for a long time — that all the luck in the world does not let this fact reach her father —, but this is a dream too far from her reality.

She had heard stories about the deserters' difficulties in returning to their homes; there is no reason to try if you know you would die. However, the girl keeps a flame of hope burning, as well as her professional aspirations, kept deep within her soul.

Observing the stars, Hyejoo has to blink several times and still scratch her eyes to conclude that she had not seen wrong: something is flying through the sky. She exchanges her lens for a thicker one, enlarging the image, and then identifies it, even if it is still cloudy. It's a girl — or a woman, Olivia still doesn't know. She rides a broom, Hyejoo presumes, given the way the stranger holds her hands in front of her.

She opens her mouth in disbelief, knowing exactly what it means. It's a witch, it can only be! Galileo only spoke of them during his one visit and taught her how to identify them in the right way, and not with the misleading clues that the Inquisition used to use. The girl gets up quickly and drags the closet across the floor, showing the gap in the wooden wall, a hollow hole, where she keeps her bow and arrows, another thing that nobody knew she had or practiced, because only men are allowed to move with guns. She picks them up and directs her aim at the figure, looking through the scope once more before her dark arrow surely strikes the stranger, causing her to unbalance and swirl through the sky until she falls into a forest not far away.

Frantic, Olivia drops everything on top of the chair and hurries out of the room, not caring if the sound of her footsteps on the wooden floor would wake someone up, let alone walk without light, so she is being guided by her memory of the corners of the building. However, she accidentally bangs her head when she mistakes the nuns' exit door to the garden for a closet, and runs again once she can feel the lawn wet her shoes, leaving her feet cold, while grunting and massaging awkwardly her forehead.

It doesn't take long to her to find the remnants of the fall: a large tree has half its branches on the ground, broken, and there are pieces of what Hyejoo concludes to be the scattered broom. The smell of leaf and wet earth floods her nostrils.

She hears strange noises behind her, but her body is pushed forward aggressively before she can turn around.

"Ouch!" She screams, feeling the impact of an object on her back. Her knees only did not get hurt when she fell to the ground because of her clothes, and they are already terribly dirty with mud, small branches and leaves now.

“Next time, I will drag you by the hair,” disgusted, the girl — Hyejoo knows now, she is a girl, not a woman — lets go of the stick with which she had pushed her to the ground and begins to turn over the fallen branches. The youngest gets up in seconds and contains a mixture of euphoria and fear.

"You are a witch!" Hyejoo says aloud and, in response, receives angry looks.

"Do not tell me," quips the stranger, bitterly. “And you are the unfortunate human being who shot me. See that?” She points to the remains of her broom. "It's your fault!"

"I..." she feels uncomfortable, not knowing what to think. In fact, she didn't know what she was thinking when she shot the arrow. "Forgive me. Are you hurt?”

The witch looks at her from head to toe, assessing her reaction. With screams and death threats it is easy to get used; now, with strangeness, not so much. Finally, she throws away a stick that disturbs her, picking up a cloth bag on the floor and shaking it off the dirt before putting the straps on her shoulders. Hyejo frowns.

"It's a funny way to hold a bag," she comments.

"I prefer to call it a backpack," the witch shifts her shoulders. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm leaving before your friends tie me to a fire to be killed."

After assimilating the sentence and having a fabulous idea, Hyejoo grabs the witch's arm, which moves away abruptly with the touch.

"What do you think you're doing!?" she exclaims, exaggerating her bodily gestures. “Honestly, and I here thinking that you were just a silly young woman, but you are just like those bastards! How many gold coins did you promise to capture me?”

"Excuse me?" Outraged, the youngest responds. How did that little witch have the courage to resemble her image to those indoctrinated madmen? Wasn't it obvious how much she despised them? “Don't say what you don't know! In no way am I like the hypocrites I am forced to live with, thank you,” saying this, she turns around, walking with aggressive steps in the opposite direction, leaving the girl with purple hair surprised.

"You can call me Yerim," the witch says before Hyejoo had the chance to disappear from her sight. Hyejoo, on the other hand, stops immediately, smiling contentedly with her head down and embarrassed even with Yerim looking only at her back.

She spins and approaches again, but screams are heard not far from there before she has a chance to say her own name. Yerim's sullen expression returns and, beside her, a worried Olivia.

"Take me with you, please," she hastens to ask. The witch laughs. “Please, Yerim, please. I can't stay here anymore. I'm walking into madness.”

“Then you will follow whatever I say, even if it sounds crazy,” after thinking, she says yes.

The witch then, grabs Olivia's waist and starts running, propelling the tallest body with her. The girl immediately thinks that Yerim's life is in danger because of her and, in fact, it is, so she fells bad, but she still does not regret it.

The witch's hand starts to grip hers possessively, guiding her through the dense forest that appears in front of her. Olivia had never entered the forest, however much she wanted to, so she is unaware of its trails. She saw only what her window allowed her to see.

She is startled when the cold water embraces her feet, rising to her knees as she runs. If she is right, they would cross the river where the cathedral's nuns fetch water. There is not much more ground from then on, but Yerim does not stop, continuing to run and run faster and faster. Hyejoo's lungs burn from lack of habit, her muscles go limp, not even the adrenaline is managing to overcome the pain in her legs. And those clothes... Heavens! They're killing her!

They stop abruptly when they see the cliff, already two meters from its edge. Olivia looks back in fright as she begins to see the blurs of fire. There is no way out.

The witch looks at her.

"Even if it sounds crazy?" Hyejoo asks, taking a deep breath.

"Even if it sounds crazy," the other confirms.

In a silent gesture of confidence, the youngest gets carried away, jumping next to Yerim. She prepares for the fall, for the wind to lift her hair, for the chill in her belly. But she has none of them. All she feels is a shiver all over your body and a slight pain in her feet.

Olivia opens her eyes: she's still in the dark forest, Yerim at her side, holding her hand. She turns around, seeing, seconds later, the priest, his disciples, some court men and the rest of the inquisitors coming out of the woods, all with sharp weapons or burning torches in their hands. Among them, she sees her father, right on the front line. The witch recognizes the younger woman's look at the man and shakes her hand in a gesture of, not affection, but compassion.

Almost panicking, Olivia is stunned to realize that they pay no attention to her presence there, or the witch's. Or rather, they cannot see them. They look, make their best faces confused, angry, check the cliff... and _nothing_. It's magic, it _has_ to be. Hyejoo realizes that the ground she is standing on now is lower. So, she had jumped, at most, half a meter.

"They can't see us, but they can hear us," she shivers from head to toe to have the witch's sweet voice whisper the phrase in her ear. She sighs too, trying to get more of the delicious cherry scent she finds coming from her. "Let's get out of here."

They walk and, only when they are far enough, does the girl manifest.

“By the way, my name is Hyejoo. Son Hyejoo,” she says. Walking a few meters in front of her, Yerim smiles. “How much longer do we have to walk? Not that I'm one of those girls who complain about everything, but I'm tired and cold.”

The purple head feels bad for not taking into account that her new travel companion is not of her kind —  Yerim is used to not sleeping, after all, witches just go through fatigue, but Hyejoo does not —, and stops immediately, now bothered by having a traveling companion.

“We can sleep here. I do not see a problem."

And with a hand gesture, Yerim makes purple flowers grow in a two-meter-diameter circle around both girls, delighting in the peasant's marvelous reaction.

"You will find that they are very comfortable and pleasant to the senses."

Due to exhaustion, the girl is unable to ask any of the thousand questions she has accumulated about the fantastic world of magic and its relationship with her beloved science. She lies down and lets her limp body rest, falling into a deep sleep. Yerim sits next to her and takes out a mantle and book from the bag about the natural laws of magic. The mantle she puts on the body of the fragile human, who snuggles up to it like an ant in its nest.

(...)

Hyejo is having a good, very good dream. She doesn't know what it is or what it is about, but she feels it is. And there is this feeling about a symbol engraved in her memory that she knows it's comes from it. She are awake, feeling as if she is floating, as if her whole body is floating. It feels good, until she realizes that no part of her really touches the surface.

She opens her eyes in despair and, seeing the immensity of the blue sky, she screams. Her body falls to her feet and would have been injured if Yerim's warm arms had not wrapped around her waist with last-minute force.

"Take it easy, wolf," she jokes and lets go. Olivia looks around. She doesn't know where they are, and it's definitely not where she slept at dawn.

They are at the top of somewhere, stepping on stone and sand; so high that she only sees a blur of the highest tower of the cathedral and the entire length of the river Iss. The dry smell of malnourished earth and the strong sun hitting itself.

“It is almost noon. You seemed to sleep well, so I decided to go on the walk alone. It was a wise decision on my part, as I think you wouldn't be able to climb with those clothes or these butter muscles.”

The girl looks down, ignoring the offense, seeing thick and large layers of stone overlapping each other, and then in front of her, where a large ancient temple stands, and this is evidenced by the slime growing on the pebbles.

"I prefer 'woman of science', thank you," Hyejoo counters, watching the witch laugh.

"When you're a woman, maybe I'll call you that," she says, then moves on, going up the few steps and entering the building through the large gap, this considered the entrance, followed by the smallest.

"I am a woman!" Revokes Hyejoo, indignant.

“No, you're a girl. You must be, at the most, eighteen. And look, I'm being generous! As I recall, this is not much.”

“For your knowledge, I can already get married and I am considered a lady by society. And you say that like you're old! I bet you're my age.”

“We witches don't have this age thing. We do not count our lifetime. We will always continue to exist in some way in nature, whether as a flower or as the wind.”

The entrance to the temple introduces them to a narrow, dark corridor. Yerim touches both walls and they light up, seeming to contain fire inside their viscera. They continue until the end, arriving at an oval and extremely high room, equally lit, with a large stone table in the center and strange symbols on the walls. Hyejoo has the sensation of smelling the wind itself, pure and light, while the witch seems to know exactly which way to go among the heaps of floors.

"It was good that you broke my broom," she comments, randomly. "I mean, not because you made me fall or because you hit me with an arrow, because I still want to hit you in the head for that, but I was going the wrong way."

“Did the arrow hit you? I thought I just broke the broom on impact,” says Hyejoo, surprised. The purple head negates, showing the tear on the left side of her shirt, right at the waist. "But if it hit you, how-"

"Nature heals us," she interrupts. “We are not unnatural monsters as you usually think. Witches are works of nature, we serve her, we use her resources, we take care that she continues to exist and is not mistreated by selfish idiots. It is our source of power.”

Hyejoo strives to pay attention to the path they take. They are walking almost glued to the wall. The symbols seem to repeat themselves or follow some sort of ordered chain, and the girl is startled when she recognizes one of them, as she is sure she saw it in her dream: ᚫᚱ.

“Hey! I've seen this one. I dreamed with it,” Olivia points out and Yerim frowns, wondering. “It's a symbol, isn't it? What does it mean?"

“This is not a symbol, it is a word. It means air. Why you dreamed about it is what I would like to know.”

“If it's a word, does it belong to a language? Is it the demon's tongue? My dad already talked about it.”

Almost offended and clearly angry at the girl's presumption, Yerim hit the wall hard. “Never say anything like that again! We are in a sacred temple. It's disrespectful!” She sighs. “You should stop paying attention to what your dad's fool words. In fact, what all humans say! They know nothing. This is Cirth, this is the Elven language. The elves came before us and were extinct before the human era began. We use the runes to communicate without anyone being aware of anything.”

“I'm sorry, but I had no way of knowing that. I'm still trying to assimilate a lot, okay?” Hyejoo says. The purple head lets out the breath she is holding when she is forced to accept that the human was right. "What is it talking about?" Seeing the witch relax, she asks again, pointing to the rest of the runes on that wall. Yerim approaches to find out.

“It's talk about air witches. I've heard of them, but they've been extinct for a few hundred years. They were so powerful that humans only started hunting us when there was no sign of them. They were very treacherous, if you ask me. I was told that they liked to attract humans and make them kill each other,” she explains and walks again. But Olivia is still not satisfied.

“Are there air witches? How does it work? Why were they extinct?”

“Calm down, wolf, one thing at a time,” Yerim takes a moment to read something, but leaves it aside when she sees that it is not in her interest, continuing the conversation. “Witches can feed on anything that comes from nature, even on a rock, but there is one element in common that makes us stronger than any other. Earth, water, fire or air. However, just as one is our life, the other can be our death. A fire witch only dies if she is drowned; earth witches fear height; water witches are the only ones who burn to death; and the air ones are claustrophobic. The extinction of air witches began when humans discovered that they were born powerless, like an ordinary person, and acquired powers later. They began to annihilate any girl, child or not, who gave evidence of witchcraft. They murdered many innocent people, but they fulfilled their purpose. People say that the next ones to cease to exist are the water witches, due to the excess of bonfires and everything, but I highly doubt it. They really know how to be discreet.”

"This is fascinating," Olivia comments, wishing she had her precious pens, thousands of papers and pots of ink to file every detail out of the other girl's mouth.

"Yeah, I think so too," the witch looks more animated as she approaches another wall. "Look, here it is!" She puts her hand over the runes and sighs in relief.

“What is there? What did you think? What are we looking for?”

"You have serious anxiety problems," she says as if it were a statement, closing her eyes for a moment. “We came to look for the whereabouts of Baba Yaga. I was traveling, coming from the east, but I got lost and, well, she doesn't stop for nothing. I have to achieve it.”

"Baba Yaga?" Hyejoo's face makes a strange expression, not even knowing what the shorter one is talking about.

“I shouldn't be saying this to a human like you, but since you have no intention of returning to your species, I believe there will be no problem… Baba Yaga is kind of a mother nature for us. She is the most powerful witch of all. She takes care of us, but she doesn't like to walk alone and I appreciate her company. I'm your apprentice.”

"So why weren't you with her?" The human feels confused, and tries to force her mind to understand.

The witch slowly assesses her, causing the girl to blush strongly, having this high stubbornness that she struggled to support the older woman's gaze. “I had duties to do. Alert the witches of the east about the revolution.”

Hearing the word 'revolution', Olivia feels her whole body shiver. Of fear.

"Revolution? Did you mean… a war? Between humans and witches?”

"Exactly, pretty wolf," she replies and smiles contentedly, ignoring the young woman's stunned face and almost stepping over her to head for the exit.

"Wait! Why a civil war? We didn't even imagine that we would have to fight anything. Humans and witches. We wouldn't stand a chance!” The scholar claims. It is not that she loves her species unconditionally, but there are those with whom she cares and, like it or not, would end up being harmed.

“That is the intention. Now shut up.You're irritating me.”

"Shut up? I won't shut up! You shut up! A war would only bring death and suffering. It is clearly the most wrong way possible! There are innocents who are going to get hurt, maybe die. It's a waste of humanity,” without even realizing it, Hyejoo is screaming desperately, feeling her lungs burn and her hands tremble. She wants to have a voice, she wants to be able to stop that right now. In reaction, the witch freezes, steadying her feet on the ground and keeping her eyes on the horizon for seconds. "It is a waste of humanity, Yerim."

The girl approaches the witch, taking a deep breath and standing beside her.

"Not when a noble cause is embraced by those who can make a difference," as she turns to the student, she notices her closed, irritated and furious expression. Yerim realizes that her tone of voice is causing extreme excitement in Hyejoo. “Do you think innocents of yours would die? What about the millions, Son Hyejoo, millions of innocent witches who have never harmed even a single plant and still were hanged, drowned, tortured and thrown into some filthy sewer as if they were nothing? What about women of your own kind who had the same fate for raising their voices, asking for respect? We make war, Son Hyejoo, because this is the only language that men understand.”

The witch walks again and Olivia, for the first time, feels like crying. She feels that burning in her throat, the vibrations behind her eyes. She doesn't even know what for, but her heart flutters and a deep sadness is mixed with the smell of earth that enters her nostrils. She always thought that the silence and the act of crying were irritating and uncomfortable, but this is how she starts to accompany Yerim: silent and crying without making any noise, keeping a certain distance out of shame.

When they leave the temple, they walk for a long time, stopping only during the sunset when passing by a small stream, where Yerim thinks that filling the bottle is an very intelligent action — the newly made object with bark from trees — so that the human won't be thirsty.

Hyejoo is grateful to see berries in the bushes. Cherries, blackberries, strawberries and beautiful apples high in the trees. Just one touch of the witch on the branches and three apples fall instantly. It is fascinating.

They do not speak, however. Yerim walks again not long afterwards, silently forcing her companion to get up from the grass and follow her. They never stop and Hyejoo finds the opportunity to notice each of the places they pass. A family of squirrels live in one of the tallest trees. In another, there is a tiny baby bird trying to fly. In a grass, and seeing this makes her feel scared, in front of the hut, white wolves rest. The creatures do not even look at them, as if they did not care enough about their existence to do so.

Then, she notices the color change of the sky, which only gets darker and darker, however, something in front of her manages to be even more and more clear.

In the light of the moon and the flood of stars, Yerim shines. She shines like Hyejoo has never seen anyone shine before, not even in her dreams. In her eyes, she looks like the most valuable thing in the world, a treasure to be cared for and protected. All that purple light being emitted from her skin, all that energy surrounding her. More beautiful than the biggest diamond. But the witch suddenly seems tense, walking more slowly and apprehensive with her own movements as soon as she realizes what had started to happen to her. So the younger girl doesn't make a single sound, trying to show her witch she respects her privacy. 

The effect lasts until the stars fade with the coming of the sun, causing the moon to fade from the sky and Hyejoo wonders why the same thing didn't happen the night before. This is a curiosity to study, but her object of study does not seem to want to be approached and she acquired a certain fear of irritating the purple head.

At dawn, the future scientist begins to identify a small building behind a lot of trees. It is a small house with three windows and a chimney emitting smoke from the roof. Yerim, to the relief of the youngest, intertwines her fingers with hers and pulls her forward, until she stops in front of the wooden door. She knocks on the door a few times before screaming.

“Baba Yaga? Baba Yaga, are you there? It's me!"

The door opens. A wrinkled and smiling figure is present, wearing colorful clothes with striking prints and large and flashy accessories. The old woman approaches the two girls and takes a good look at Son Hyejoo, who feels all of her hairs stand on end, smiling then and shyly turning to Yerim.

“You are a human, dear! A human! You see? Pretty girl! When is the wedding?” Baba Yaga asks, eyes wide and face anxious.

Hyejoo feels her cheeks heat up and looks at the witch beside her for help. But Yerim is not much help now that she is choking on her own saliva, needing a few seconds to recover and assemble the sentences with some sense in her head.

"Baba Yaga, this is Son Hyejoo and we are _not_ getting married," the youngest witch introduces, pushing her travel companion into the small hut so that she can feel the warmth of the fire. It is a cold dawn, however much neither of them has shown to care.

"What? There is no wedding?” The apprentice shakes her head, giving herself the intimacy of rummaging through Baba Yaga's shelves. "Well, if so, I conclude that you have fulfilled your purpose in the north."

"East", Yerim corrects. Baba Yaga always was a little crazy, but nature always gives clues when it's time to take her position in the next life. One of those ways is by taking away the good memory that the old woman once had.

“Ah, yes, it is the same. East,” she agrees, while Yerim handles a knife and bread. "And then?"

“The water nymphs will support us, so will the witches from Jiwoo and Jungeun's clan. They will all be presents at the Sabbath, Baba Yaga”, she replies, delivering a sandwich to Hyejoo, who is feeling an intruder while listening to someone else's conversation and proceeding in the same place. "Eat. You didn't have the chance to eat much.”

Baba Yaga approaches the pretty human and makes her sit in a rocking chair, the one made of a tree trunk, clearly an object of colorful fruit, padded with yellow and blue flowers, as well as almost all the fabric of the clothes of the older witch. The girl thanked her for her kindness, taking the opportunity to put her feet close to the fire and warm them.

Yerim sided with Baba Yaga, but tenderly fit in with a stubborn girl.

"You know what you have to do, don't you?" Baba Yaga's tone is severe.

"Yes. Yes, I know."

Baba Yaga, then, offers Olivia a comfortable bed and a good sleep, which she gladly accepts, happy to sleep on something as soft as a mattress after two days of walking and napping in leaves and flowers. That mattress is even softer than her own bed in the cathedral, she notes. Well, her _old_ bed.

She has no dreams this time, just a dark image throughout her heavy sleep, while Baba Yaga and the other witch work tirelessly for the Sabbath not far from the hut, with the certainty that the little girl would not go anywhere. She has nowhere to go, after all.

When she wakes up, she sees that the moon has already taken its place in the sky through the small window above her bed. However, she strangely feels a soft arm around her waist, a cherry scent and that delicious energy surrounding the air. Hyejoo turns around cautiously, trying not to wake Yerim, but being surprised to see that the witch is already awake. The heavy eyes, glazed right in her, and a smile on the side. Hyejoo can't help but smile back.

"What time is it?" She takes the initiative to speak, seeing that the witch doesn't seem interested in moving an inch.

"It's after midnight."

"What is it?" She asks feeling the warmth on her cheeks from embarrassment.

"Nothing. You are beautiful,” the witch praises her, approaching and looking tirelessly into her mouth.

"Thanks. You are beautiful too…” Hyejoo returns the compliment, still shy, but still does not move away, but closes her eyes, longing for what came next.

She had heard about that before: women who like women, but she had never imagined she could be one of them. For some reason, at that moment, kissing Yerim's dry lips was nowhere near a bad idea. She was so tempting, like the apple of Paradise to Eva.

"I know," and Yerim finally takes the first step, wrapping the youngest girl's lips in hers and tightly, keeping her close.

Hyejoo feels her tightening her body: her waist, her breasts, her thighs. She feels hot, something she has never experienced before, starting to emit strange grunts through her mouth, which she has never ever heard done — they are moans. The girl recognizes them as such because, when she passed the priest's office on Saturdays after Mass, she always listened to them. Moans of pleasure. She wonders if Baba Yaga could hear her, but without really caring, as it is not her desire to stop.

However, much to her discontent, Yerim simply walks away. She stops. Hyejoo feels her head spin. She feels limited, suddenly unable, locked. She can hear her father's voice, the priest's voice and the voice of the man who announces the bad news in her city. She whispers to herself that this is impossible.

"Yerim?" She calls, still without opening her eyes. She begins to smell the blood and wet hay, such things that she was forced to smell when accompanying her father when there were meetings with the Church.

Beggar for less bad memories and more, much more, sensations of Yerim, she opens her eyes and freezes when she sees the people of her village looking at her. But they are so low...

No, Hyejoo is high one. High because she remains on the wooden stage being the center of attention. Limited because her hands are tied together by ropes. Impossible because a cloth had been put in her mouth, with a taste of dirt and wine. Locked because there is a rope around her neck.

Beside, the priest shouts a few sentences to the crowd, accompanied by the girl's father and friends from the church. The nuns, with whom she used to share the few classes, keep kneeling a little away from her with their hands clasped against their foreheads, praying. Her father doesn't look at her, but she can see the smile on his lips. The smile that tells how much happy he is for finally getting rid of his daughter once and for all, with an excuse more than acceptable to her maternal family.

When Olivia looks at the people, the same people she used to attend mass with, who told her stupid things about her behavior and her lack of interest in the dogmas of the Church, she feels her heart empty. They are all there, very happy to see the girl in such a compromising position. But a particularly familiar face attracts her attention and she can barely believe in it.

Yerim is far away, wearing black, beautiful and expensive clothes, with white gloves and a charming dark hat. Hyejoo's eyes fill with tears, begging internally to return to the moment that, she thinks, was seconds ago. She also begs the witch to look at her, screaming. Just once, so that the purple head would lift her pretty eyes and fix them on Olivia's. However, the witch lowers her head and starts walking, no looking back.

Hyejoo tries to scream, but someone pulls the lever before she can do it.

**Author's Note:**

> dfgjkç you guys can always find me at tumblr (@hosiexa) and at twitter (guess what... @hosiexa fghj very original, right??).
> 
> see ya in my other works!


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